Daniela

Daniela enjoyed the feel of the wind on her cheeks as she walked through the silent neighborhood. She pulled up the collar of her jacket and picked up her pace, so that she was almost jogging, the syncopated tap of her feet on the asphalt calming her frenetic mind.

Sometimes she just needed to move—and the time she spent walking around her neighborhood was like a balm for her soul.

When she was a kid, she’d been incapable of sitting still for longer than a few minutes at a time. There was just so much to think about, so much to do . . . her brain was always running in fifth gear. Unless she was passionate about something—like painting—she just couldn’t focus for very long.

Even as a kid, if she was bored by something the teacher was saying in class, she’d just get up and roam around the room, looking at stuff. Add in the strange seizures and then, later, the odd leather gloves she was forced to wear, and she knew she must’ve driven the already stressed-out and time-strapped public schoolteachers crazy.

The last Dream Keeper. Under my protection.

These words haunted Daniela.

Until the last few days, she’d felt torn. Her mother, Hessika, Eleanora . . . they’d all believed the girl would come. Daniela, on the other hand, hadn’t known what to believe. Not until she’d come to Echo Park, and Eleanora had introduced her to Lizbeth. That was when she’d felt the first glimmers of possibility, a thing she’d long thought extinguished inside her.

Now there was actually something to hold on to. Someone real to believe in, so that the promise she’d made to her mother could be kept in good faith.

The sound of a car idling up ahead caught her attention, and she slowed down, instinct warning her to be cautious. It was a Lincoln Town Car with black-tinted windows, and the exhaust from its tailpipe curled around its metal body, creating a ghostly fog that caught the glow from the streetlights and reflected it.

As she came even with the car, the back passenger window rolled down, and, against her better judgment, Daniela stopped, curiosity getting the better of her. A pale white head appeared in the frame of the window, and Daniela let out a low whistle, her nervousness giving over to relief as she realized that she knew the man.

“You scared me,” Daniela said leaning into the window. “What’re you even doing here? I thought you were in New York?”

The man shook his head, his wrinkled face breaking into a smile.

“We heard things were afoot here, and the Greater Council decided it was time to send in the big dogs,” the man said, shrugging.

“And by big dogs, they mean you,” Daniela said, grinning back at him.

Other than Eleanora, Desmond Delay had been her mother’s closest confidant, and Daniela trusted him implicitly. Though he wasn’t a blood relative, he’d always treated Daniela and Marie-Faith like they were family—and Daniela often wondered if he’d been in love with her mother.

“Get in the car,” he said, gesturing for her to join him. “You must be freezing out there.”

He opened the door and scooted over so she could climb in beside him. He was right. It was much warmer in the car—especially after he shut the door and rolled up the window.

“Shall we take you home?” he asked.

“I’d appreciate that,” she said, and then leaned over and gave him a hug.

He felt fragile in her arms, and she realized it’d been six months since she’d last seen him.

At her mother’s funeral.

And the intervening months had not been good to him.

“I’ve missed you,” she said as she pulled away from him.

“I’ve missed you, too,” he replied, and there was a rheumy redness to his sad gray eyes. One that hadn’t been there before.

To her pleasure and surprise, she saw he still carried the walking stick she’d had made for his sixtieth birthday. She’d chosen the silvery lion’s head because to her, he would always be her lion, doing whatever was necessary to look after and protect her family.

The gift had been in recognition of this.

“You still use it,” she said, pleased.

“Of course,” he said, hoisting the cane in the air for her to see. “You gave it to me.”

Her heart was filled with love for the wily old man sitting beside her, and she took his hand, squeezing it in her own gloved one.

“There’s so much to tell you, Desmond,” she said, finding herself, as always, intoxicated by his presence.

“Yes,” he said, pleasantly. “Tell me everything.”